How An Online Fandom Put Be More Chill On Broadway

When Chase Brock signed on to choreograph a new musical at a theater in New Jersey in 2015, he couldn't have predicted that four years later, hewould be receiving fan art featuring his Chihuahua because of it. Nor could he have he imagined that the show—Be More Chill, based on the young adult novel by Ned Vizzini—would be heading to Broadway with one of the most enthusiastic teenage fan bases the Great White Way has ever seen.

The origin story of Be More Chill is already one of musical theater legend. After a month-long run at the Two River Theater, the creative team—including Brock, director Stephen Brackett, writer Joe Tracz and composer/lyricist Joe Iconis—thought the show's lifespan had unjustly passed. About two years later, Brock began noticing fan art popping up on Instagram, and assumed that Be More Chill was being performed at high schools or community theaters. (It wasn't yet: The show only became available to license in July 2017.) Instead, the cast recording was being streamed, over and over again, as teens discovered the show—and the rapidly growing canon of cosplay, fan fiction and fan art surrounding it—on YouTube, Tumblr and Instagram. By the spring of 2018, the album had been streamed over 100 million times. Be More Chill's success online is what convinced producers that it was ready for an off-Broadway production, which sold out before opening night; an extension of the run sold out in less than eight hours.

A move to Broadway, where the show begins previews this month, was almost inevitable. But the unapologetically quirky production will still be an underdog, just like its protagonist, Jeremy, a high school loser who ingests a pill-sized supercomputer called a Squip to help him be cool—or rather, "chill."

Brock partially attributes Be More Chill's wackiness to the absence of a commercial producer during development. "We were allowed to just do our thing, and as a result the show is spikier and stranger," he says. This freedom is also reflected in Brock's high-energy choreography, which draws from sources as various as a Belgian street dance called jumpstyle, and finger-tutting, which represents the digital world of the Squips. (His most memorable fan experience so far involved a teenage girl sitting near him on opening night off-Broadway, perfectly executing a complex finger-tutting sequence.)

Photo by Maria Baranova, Courtesy Keith Sherman & Associates

What was it like to visually shape a show that thousands of fans had listened to but never seen? "I had to trust that if one part of the show was connecting strongly then all the other parts would connect that strongly, too," says Brock.

But Be More Chill will need more than a teenage cult following to survive on Broadway. Brock says the show already has a growing fan base in the parents who brought their superfan tweens to the off-Broadway production. But the goal isn't to appeal to everyone, anyway. In fact, Brock believes that part of what has made the show so successful thus far is how it has connected with a very specific group: LGBTQ teens who consider themselves outsiders. Be More Chill's popularity on social media has generated an unprecedented collaboration with these fans, who have imagined new relationships between characters that are now alluded to in the show. "They are speaking back to us," says Brock, "and we have a responsibility of listening."

Latest Posts

In the new film Shirley, Elisabeth Moss stars as Shirley Jackson, the horror writer who rose to fame with her 1948 short story "The Lottery." The controversial hit led to the most mailThe New Yorker had ever received about a work of fiction. Jackson went on to write hundreds more short stories and numerous books, including The Haunting of Hill House, which was adapted into a Netflix series in 2018.

In the film, a young couple moves in with Jackson and her philandering husband, a professor at Bennington College. Shirley initially resents this intrusion, and the ensuing drama inspires her next novel. Like one of her stories, the movie is a psychological thriller, where the line between imagination and reality is blurred.

<p>"About six weeks to a month before we shot, Josephine sent me a storyboard and a whole lookbook. I found that really inspiring because I often struggle, in my own work, to communicate all my ideas. I thought, why don't I make lookbooks?" Driscoll said in a recent conversation.</p><p>After rehearsal, we headed to a hotel for the night. As a concert dancer, even this indie film felt lavish to me: All our meals were provided and we each got our own hotel room. The next morning we were up early to head back to set for hair and makeup. This was a long process, but watching the hair and makeup team get everyone into 1940s glam was one of my favorite parts of the experience.</p><p>The costume team sourced almost all the clothing from vintage stores, so most of what we were wearing was completely authentic to the time period. We were included in the crowd scenes, which showed students coming and going from class, as well as a few others, so we changed between different costumes throughout the day, sneaking in extra rehearsal time here and there.</p>

<p>To help direct movement in certain parts of the film, including crowd scenes and an eerie dream sequence, director Josephine Decker brought on choreographer <a href="https://www.dancemagazine.com/search/?q=Faye+Driscoll" target="_self">Faye Driscoll</a>, who has choreographed extensively for theater and film in addition to her own performance work. Driscoll also worked with Decker on the acclaimed indie film <em>Madeline's Madeline</em>.</p><p>At the last minute, the production team decided to cast dancers for a few scenes. I was one of them, and the whirlwind experience was my first commercial gig. I answered a casting call on a Tuesday, and by Friday I was in a van being driven to Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, where <em>Shirley</em> was filming on location. There were three other dancers—Tara Sheena, Lyric Danae, and Allegra Herman. We had just one afternoon to rehearse our main scene, which was shot the next day.</p><p>Our dance scene was the dream sequence, where we appeared alongside actress Victoria Pedretti, whose character is something of a temptress. As we dove into our rapid rehearsal process, Driscoll started by showing us a collection of images she and Decker had compiled to inspire the scene, ranging from sexy to grotesque.</p>

<p>By the time we got to our dance scene, the sun had gone down. We were working in and around a large tree, and the crew had set up a single massive light to illuminate the area. It was late in the day and everyone had been working since early that morning. We were told, basically, to just go for it. We performed several different movement sequences that Driscoll had put together, with the camera rolling the whole time.<br></p><p>"Those days there were like tech, dress, and a show, but with no catharsis," says Driscoll. "I love working in film, but so much of it really is delayed gratification."</p>

<p>With no real-time feedback, it's hard to tell whether what you're doing is working or not—but the crew and other actors on set were enthusiastic. "I remember people being so blown away, which was so interesting, because that wasn't something I would put on stage. But it was nice to see, because as dancers we labor and labor away for the people who love this thing that we do. And that's part of what is so valuable, that we have this community. But to get to do something like this that was a little bit weird, and a little bit outside the mainstream, it gives us a boost," says Driscoll.</p><p>Of course, we left the set knowing that everything we did could end up being cut from the film. This is partly true: Driscoll says that only a small snippet made it in. But even that little bit, as well as her work directing the movement of bodies in other scenes, shows how a dancer's perspective can enrich film.</p><p>"So many people are really not in their bodies, and that's surprising to dancers," says Driscoll. "A little bit of the information we have can go a long way."</p><p>You don't have to wait for theaters to reopen to see the movie—<em>Shirley </em>is available on Hulu and on-demand platforms like iTunes and Amazon Prime starting today.</p>